


rewind

by whittler_of_words



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Doomed Timelines, Gen, Sadstuck, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-02
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-15 20:31:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2242602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whittler_of_words/pseuds/whittler_of_words
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You have never hated a place as much as you hate LOHAC. </p>
<p>Four months. Four months you suffer through the suffocating, liquid heat. Four months of the tick, four months of tock, four months of game mechanics and details and intricacies and timelines; four months of enemies and Rose. Both of you isolated in your own little bubbles of misery. Both of you stuck. Both of you trapped.</p>
            </blockquote>





	rewind

**Author's Note:**

> Reader be warned, this is not a happy fic.

The Land of Heat and Clockwork.

What a fucking joke.

Gears spinning on nothing, lava on almost every surface and you should be dead, by all rights, but why would the laws of physics ever apply to something like this? A constant tick, tick, tick-ing, low and deep and resounding through your very center, through your bones, making your skull buzz. Making your vision go slightly blurry with every barely-audible boom.

You have never hated a place as much as you hate LOHAC. 

Four months. Four months you suffer through the suffocating, liquid heat. Four months of the _tick_ , four months of **tock** , four months of game mechanics and details and intricacies and timelines; four months of enemies and Rose - four months of having to watch Rose slowly spiral down into her own personal hell of neon pastel and alcohol, unable to reach her because We are both where we are needed most, if we are to patch together the Alpha timeline. Please stay where you are, Dave. Both of you isolated in your own little bubbles of misery. Both of you stuck. Both of you trapped.

Even dreaming offers no reprieve. Derse is nothing but a planet of whispers, whispers of _you could have saved them you could have done better it is your fault they are gone it is your fault you could have it is your_ repeated over and over and over and Rose is constantly in the Dersite libraries, buildings where you feel that you are unwelcome, where you feel uncomfortable and Rose looks at home. 

Four months and you come to a revelation.

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] \--

TG: thats it i cant take it anymore   
TG: all of this was a huge mistake    
TG: but dont worry   
TG: im going to fix it   
TT: Already?   
TG: what do you mean already shit took 4 goddamn months   
TG: or something   
TG: i dont know im kind of losing track of how long its been with all this time hopping   
TT: It just sounds like you’re making a rash decision.   
TT: I thought we agreed to go as far as we could before you went back.   
TT: To gather information, and avoid repeating mistakes.   
TG: what else is there to know   
TG: we lost   
TG: cant finish the game with a dead heir and witch   
TT: We don’t know Jade is dead for sure.   
TG: yeah well she had a big fucking meteor bearing down on her and we never heard from her again   
TG: or the trolls for that matter   
TG: after they tricked john into skipping way ahead and getting his ass handed to him by the denizen   
TG: i guess once they managed to sabotage us they were done with us    
TG: and since john died he couldnt get jade in on time so whether shes alive or not shes as good as dead from our perspective   
TG: only thing left to do is change all that   
TT: Are you sure you're ready?   
TT: You'll remember the plan we discussed?   
TG: theres not much to remember   
TG: but you see the thing is   
TG: fuck the plan   
TT: Dave?   
TG: do you really think theres a chance of any of this working   
TG: that theres a chance in any possible universe that this game would actually work like its supposed to   
TG: that me going through with this will somehow lead us to the path of victory   
TG: hell no   
TG: there is no chance of us winning   
TG: never was never has been   
TG: we were all doomed from the start   
TG: and i swear im going to fix all of that   
TT: Dave. What are you planning?   
TG: simple really   
TG: how about i turn it into a question   
TG: what do you think is the less painful way to go   
TG: being obliterated to death by a meteor   
TG: getting torn apart by your denizen   
TG: or a sword to the heart   
TT: No.   
TG: youve gone through so much these past 4 months   
TG: im sorry i havent done something to help you before now   
TG: i promise itll all be over soon ok rose   
TT: Dave, please stop and think clearly about this.   
TG: but i am though   
TG: i go back in time to when all of us are just beginning the game   
TG: and i kill us all before we can all find out what a crock of pain and heartbreak this fucking game really is   
TG: and then i guess its my turn on the skewer   
TT: This will accomplish nothing, Dave. All you will be doing is dooming this timeline.   
TG: didnt you hear me rose   
TG: we were already doomed   
TG: i just didnt realize it until now   
TG: ill see you soon   
TG: and then we can both finally get some rest   
TT: Dave!

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] ceased pestering tentacleTherapist [TT] \--

You take the gate to her planet and she’s waiting for you there. Her hair is stringy from sea-salt and her skin glistens with it. There are bags settled in deep under her eyes, for all that she spent nearly all of her time asleep.

She offers you a drink.

“I suppose,” she says, “you make a very convincing argument.” Her smile is thin and wan and trembling. The half-empty bottle is warm in your hands.

You don’t bother to clean Caledscratch’s blade when the act is done. You brush the hair out of Rose’s face and press a kiss to her forehead. The smell of salt seems almost permeated in her skin.

The Timetables are a familiar humming under you hands. You scratch back, back, to before the trolls’ sudden silence, before Jade’s disappearance, before John’s journey to his Denizen. You scratch and-

Something happens.

The transition of time is smooth. It flows, sometimes skips; but it’s never supposed to _jerk_. It has never left you stretched thin until you feel like you’re about to break, never left you breathless and gasping like this. With a massive sudden _shove_ you feel yourself being pushed sideways and then _forward_ in the timestream and you know instantly that something is wrong.

LOLAR glitters and shines and Rose’s house is peacefully, serenely empty. 

Someone pesters you.

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering turntechGodhead [TG] \--

TG: oh my fuck   
TG: you actually did it   
TG: you actually think you can do this you naive piece of doomed timeline shit

You adjust your iShades where they sit on your face and walk out of Rose’s house. 

TG: thats offensive and i am offended   
TG: whatever shall i do now that youve made me cry from those sick burns   
TG: there are actual tears streaming down my face look what youve done   
TG: oh my god SHUT UP   
TG: feisty   
TG: i wont let you do this   
TG: seriously bro out of all the cliche lines to say it had to be that one   
TG: screw you   
TG: youre the one who has it all wrong here   
TG: try to keep up   
TG: dont you dare block me

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] blocked turntechGodhead [TG] ! --

Two names are lit up on your chumroll that you thought you’d never see again.

You decide to do the hardest one first.

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] began pestering ectoBiologist [EB] \--

TG: egbert   
EB: hey dave! what’s up?

‘hey dave!’ God, you missed that dork. 

TG: where are you   
EB: on lohac. we’re looking for you actually.

LOHAC. Figures.

TG: dont move ill meet you there   
EB: sure!   
TG: and also   
TG: orange me is kind of freaking out about stupid shit rn    
TG: you should probably not listen to him   
TG: actually youre better off not even opening his chat window if he tries to pester you i think hes trying to pull some pesterchum prank related shenanigans   
EB: oh, dang. thanks for the warning, bro.   
TG: dont mention it   
TG: see u in a few

The iron taste of metal clogs your throat the exact moment you step into the gate taking you back to LOHAC. Ah, how you missed it since the five fucking minutes you were gone. 

John is waiting for you at the base of your house, dressed in some weird blue ensemble. The second you see him it hits you where you are. An alternate timeline, somehow, where at least John went God Tier. Nice. That will make this easier, absolutely no sarcasm there.

“Finally,” he says, rolling his eyes. He’s smiling though. You missed his smile. Stupid bucktoothed idiot. “You took your time!” You really didn’t. “Nice bowtie,” he says, finally taking you in, and then he peers closer. What, did he just now notice the recently-used sword in your hand? “Is that--”

A memo opens up on your iShades.

\-- turntechGodhead [TG] has opened memo on board EMERGENCY. --

TG: everybody stop what youre doing and listen to me this is serious   
TG: if you see a dave running around in a snazzy white dress shirt AVOID HIM AT ALL COSTS   
TG: according to davesprite hes unstable and also batshit insane so keep your distance and report any sightings immediately

John’s eyes widen behind his glasses as he reads the same thing you just did, and he glances at you, taking a step back. You take a step forward. He laughs. He sounds nervous.

You don’t blame him, really.

“Uhh, Dave,” he says slowly, “why don’t you put the sword--”

You put the sword through his chest and he blinks at you in utter bewilderment. He looks down at the sword sticking out of his chest. Looks up at you. Seems almost confused. A line of red spills out of the corner of his mouth and you pull the sword out, gently lowering him to the ground before he can fall.

John opens and closes his mouth, as if trying to say something, but no sound escapes. He looks up at you, up at your face, as if searching for something there, and you search right back. A shame that you had to do this, really. You didn’t want to cause unnecessary pain, but you couldn’t let him get away. You probably wouldn’t have been able to find him again if he did.

He looks at something past you, behind you, and you don’t move in time.

Your head hurts. Everything is over-bright in the way it gets when your shades are off, skewed in the way it gets when you’re lying on the ground, and you can’t move in the way it gets when your wrists are bound as something smelling of alcohol soaks into your shirt.

Broken glass litters the floor.

You hadn’t realized that you’d still been holding onto the bottle.

“--fine, see?”

Well, that’s John’s voice. He must have revived while you were out, then. Damn. 

“Okay okay, forgive me for being concerned when my best bro just got metal introduced to his insides.”

That’d be you.

Wonderful.

The puddle of alcohol is warm and wet and uncomfortable, for obvious reasons and others you don’t want to think about. You can’t see anything from where you’re face-down on the metal, anyway, and after a moment of feeling out your bonds, you sit up.

You’re closer to the edge of the platform than you’d like.

In the time it takes you to notice this, the lack of Caledscratch pings like an alarm in your head until you notice it kicked across to the other side, blade still wet. It looks like John and You, decked in red God Tier garb, are between you and it, in any case. 

“Uh,” John says, noticing your newly regained state of consciousness, and other Dave turns around. His face is flat, but he taps his finger against his leg in the nervous tic you’ve been trying and failing to train yourself out of for years. 

You grin.

“Okay,” other Dave says, and runs a hand through his hair, “I don’t even want to know how you managed to dive off the deep end, like, I’m pretty sure that breaks some Strider code or some shit. But seriously? You gotta go around killing John? Next thing I know you’re gonna make shiskabob a la Jade. The fuck, dude.” Not said: _how could you do this, this is John, our friend, and nobody hurts our friends, not even ourselves._ You kind of can’t help but snort in amusement at that. 

He doesn’t get it. Figures.

Next thing you know there’s the rustling of wings somewhere vaguely gateward and orange you (the You you were _supposed_ to be) settles close to the others, his expression just as carefully blank as his/your alternate. His fingers don’t twitch in the slightest.

He spits to the side - lava hisses as it falls - and other Dave raises an eyebrow.

“You know something?” He asks, and Davesprite turns to him, giving you the cold shoulder. Literally. You’re kind of proud.

“‘Course I do,” Davesprite says, “I used to _be_ him. As fucked up as it is, I know exactly what he’s thinking.” He flicks a wing in what you think is disgust. “Or, what he _was_ thinking, at least.”

“And? What’s going through this particular Dave’s head?”

“He wants to kill all of you,” Davesprite supplies. He glances over at John, who’s pretty much radiating _yeah, I kind of figured that out already, thank you sword to chest._ “For reasons.” _Reasons,_ yeah. You roll your eyes. “But something went wrong and he ended up here instead of further back in his own timeline. Don’t ask me how. Game shit.”

“Doomed timeline.” Other Dave doesn’t say it as a question. It’s painfully obvious at this point. “He’s going to die.”

“Yep.”

“There has to be something we can do,” John breaks in, and three gazes fix on him. He doesn’t waver. “We can’t just let him _die_.”

“John,” other Dave says. “You can’t fuck with doomed timelines. Hence the name doomed. Trying to change that will probably just end up with us dead, too.”

“But--”

You stop listening.

The sound of their conversation is drowned out by your own inattention as you turn your focus away. You pull a little more at your bonds, but they’re tied strong. And without Caledscratch you’re just a sitting duck. Waiting to die.

Doomed timeline.

Peering as far over the side of the gear platform as you can --which is actually pretty far, considering how close you are to the edge -- your own thoughts catch up with you. Rose is dead, but you’ve still failed. You’ve failed them all again, through yet some new fresh fuck up of the game. John, Jade, past-Rose, past-you, even, they’re all going to go through the same hell and now there’s no way for you to stop it. It’ll happen again, and again, because time never stops, because time isn’t straight; everything happens so much and it just. keeps. happening. It’s how it always goes.

Doomed timeline.

You flex your fingers into your palm. Wonder if the lava is as hot as it seems. Wonder if it’s even lava, wonder if it’s just an illusion built by the game to make everything seem more real. Maybe there are failsafes to stop some unlucky bastard from frying themselves to a crisp after a slip-up on the slick metal gears.

Maybe there’s not.

This is a chance that you are more than willing to take.

Someone shouts as you get up, and there’s the sound of someone coming after you, but you’re too fast. You throw yourself to the side with everything you have.

Heat rushes up to meet you.


End file.
